


How to Hook A Holmes (Mystrade Edition)

by gossamerstarsxx



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alcohol, Fluff, M/M, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-04
Updated: 2012-05-04
Packaged: 2017-11-04 19:48:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/397557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gossamerstarsxx/pseuds/gossamerstarsxx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>herbailiwick prompted me: Greg moves in with his friend Mycroft temporarily after a wrenching divorce, only to realize just how much they mean to each other. Uh, some doubt that either one of them or both could be desired would be a nice bonus. (If this prompt sucks or is some cliche I'm not aware of, please disregard. I don't know much about Mystrade fiction.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	How to Hook A Holmes (Mystrade Edition)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [herbailiwick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/herbailiwick/gifts).



Greg Lestrade sighed heavily as he hefted his ragged duffel bag over one shoulder. He was standing at the doorstep of what Mycroft Holmes had called a  _house_  and what Greg himself would have called a  _manor_ , and he really ought to ring the bell and let the inevitable fancy butler man take his bag and escort him to some lavishly furnished room where he could collapse on the Egyptian cotton covers and try to forget everything that had happened in the past few months, but Greg felt like some kind of street urchin just standing on the bloody  _front steps_.

He was just about to turn and walk back down the long, winding driveway when the glossy wooden door opened. To his surprise it was Mycroft himself, not Anthea or some other personal-assistant-slash-servant who answered the door.

"Lestrade, hello," said Mycroft, extending one well-manicured hand to the D.I. "I saw you on the cameras. Really, you shouldn't be so worried about staying here. I daresay it will be much more comfortable than kipping it on the couch in 221B."

Greg shook the offered hand and began to feel a tiny bit better.

 

xxxxxxxxxx

 

It was only a few weeks later that Mycroft Holmes found Greg Lestrade sitting at his desk in his study, clutching a sheet of paper in his shaking hands and reeking of the Remy Martin cognac Mycroft usually kept in the crystal decanter in the corner.

 _Divorce was finalized,_  Mycroft deduced: the paper was very wrinkled, as if it had been crumpled and smoothed back out; Greg's face was damp but in streaks, not all over, denoting tears instead of sweat.

 _Caring is not an advantage, Mycroft,_  he told himself, even as he pulled out the leather chair in front of his own desk and poured himself some of the liquor.  _It's not an advantage at all._

What he said was, "You can talk to me about it, if you wish."

Hours later, a shirtless Greg Lestrade was throwing up waves of expensive brown liquor into Mycroft's toilet while the elder Holmes leaned in the doorway, tipsy and smiling to himself, because Greg was laughing even as he was sick.

He did much prefer to see Greg Lestrade smiling.

And shirtless, but that was beside the point.

 

xxxxxxxxxx

 

Greg wasn't sure when he went from crashing at Mycroft's to being Mycroft's roommate. He thought it was some time after the night they'd gotten pissed together, talking and laughing until the cognac caught up with him. Greg didn't remember much of what they had talked about, only that Mycroft had gotten his mind off his ex wife and that Mycroft had also half-guided, half-carried him down the hall and into his own bathroom after he'd thrown up in the study trash can. He also remembered the way Mycroft had looked in the doorway, smiling at him with all of Sherlock's intelligence but none of his haughtiness.

It occurred to him that it might be a bit not good, the way his mind liked to linger on that smile, the way he was finding himself grinning like an idiot at work because he was thinking of Mycroft. It might be a bit not good at all.

 

xxxxxxxxxx

 

 _I seem to have lost an advantage,_  Mycroft thought, as he sat on the terrace with a book in his lap that he had no intention of reading.  _I seem to have lost it quite irrevocably._

Greg was standing on a ladder up against the brick wall of the mansion, t-shirt clinging to him in the heat as he fixed the broken shutter. He'd recently undergone a bit of a crisis over the fact that he was not paying Mycroft rent. He had even gone so far as to suggest that he could afford his own flat, and so Mycroft had decided he could help do a little work around the house if he was really that concerned about it.

"Oi, you could be helping me, you know," Greg called, spitting out the nails he'd been holding between his lips. He sounded irritable, but Mycroft saw the upward twitch of his mouth, the teasing light in his eyes ( _Intentional? Unintentional? Doesn't matter, handsome_ ) and simply looked up from his book with a smile.

"But you're doing so well, dear," he said, and turned a page. "I do think I'd only get in your way."

"Lazy git," Greg said, and laughed.

 _Sentiment_ , Mycroft thought to himself,  _Yes, I have lost an advantage. No matter. He will find another woman soon enough, and I will pay for my lapse in judgement after he leaves me._

_  
_

xxxxxxxxxx

 

_John, how did you ask Sherlock out on a date for the first time? -GL_

_Run away, Lestrade. Run away while you still have the chance. -JW_

_Are they that mad, then? -GL_

_Quite so. -JW_

_Well, it's too late in any case. -GL_

_I figured. -JW_

_So...how do you hook a Holmes? -GL_

_I just snorted laughing. That sounds so...awful. I don't know, Lestrade. Mycroft has a much better understanding of how normal people function in society than Sherlock. Maybe ask him to a symphony of some sort. -JW_

_John, I know next to nothing about music like that. -GL_

_Take him anyway. I'm sure he'll appreciate the gesture. -JW_

But in the end Greg didn't, because why would Mycroft want to spend an evening at the symphony with someone who couldn't even name half the instruments that were being used?

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

"You really should have asked me to that symphony, Greg," said Mycroft, striding into the hospital room with his umbrella and a small potted plant. "If you had, you would have been given the night off, and you would not have been anywhere near my idiotic little brother while he went after that arsonist."

"Yeah, well I couldn't have known when I shot that he was strapped up with some kind of explosive, it's lucky I got the shot off over a brick w--wait what? How--how did you--dammit, John!" Greg tried to sit up, but his face went alarmingly white. Mycroft pushed him gently back down into the bed and sat down on the edge of it, away from the injured leg.

"Do stop your indignant spluttering, Greg," he said gently. "If you get agitated they'll kick me out."

"Well I don't...I don't want that," Greg said. Mycroft smiled as the DI blushed beneath the bruises on his face.

"That's...quite nice to hear," said Mycroft, as he settled the little fernlike plant next to Greg's bedside table. "And John didn't tell me. It was the aforementioned idiotic little brother, actually, and he tore into me pretty well downstairs."

"Downstairs? You mean Sherlock isn't laid up?" Greg asked, incredulous.

"I'm afraid not. John is in for a concussion and a few stitches, but Sherlock got off with nothing but a few cuts and bruises," Mycroft explained, folding his hands over the handle of his umbrella. "He did, however, demand that I...explain certain things to you, before he took it upon himself to do so."

"Oh, bugger," Greg mumbled. 

 _Anxiety in his voice,_  Mycroft noted,  _He's doing that thing where he scrubs his hand down his face, always does that when he's nervous and uncomfortable. Avoiding my eyes. Hm. He misunderstands me._

"Greg--"

"Look, you don't--I mean, I get it, I do, it's fine," said Greg.

Mycroft sighed.  _He's going to start babbling._

"I'm a bit of an idiot, I know," Greg was saying.  "You did me a huge favor and I go getting all gaga like a prat, and we don't have to mention it again, you know, I do apo--"

Mycroft caught Greg's lips while they were still slightly open; he tasted of warmth and the minty hospital mouth-rinse. When the elder Holmes pulled back, intent upon explaining while Greg was still awestruck, he found himself pulled down by his coat lapels into a far more fervent kiss that had Greg's heart monitor leaping.

"Well, then," Mycroft managed to mutter several long moments later as he straighted his coat and smoothed back his gingery hair. "I am assuming that that was a sufficient enough explanation for you?"

"Let's go over it one more time," Greg said, and Mycroft couldn't help it--he laughed, and then obliged.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first Mystrade fic that I have ever written, so I apologize if the two of them seem OOC. Also, this fic has not been beta-read or Britpicked, so if you see any errors or any absolutely atrocious misuse of British slang, please let me know and I'll correct myself!


End file.
